Stores, such as bombs and mines, carried aboard or out board of aircraft have fuzes or explosive initiators which are maintained in a normally safe condition until the store is actually released from the aircraft and has fallen some predetermined distance away. This arming or other function performed on the store is often accomplished by an arming wire connected between the aircraft frame and the fuze or detonator. The wire is allowed to pay out with the falling store to some predetermined length where, upon becoming taut, a pin is extracted from the fuze or detonator to allow arming. The wire is subsequently broken at a weak link provided on the wire near the aircraft by the weight of the falling store and falls away with it. Although the cable and release mechanisms are designed with extreme simplicity, malfunctions are often encountered. The weak link may vary in breaking load, or the wire itself may break at some other location along its length, possibly near the store. In this event a length of wire (ranging up to around 20 feet) is left connected with the aircraft. It flails around in the air to interfere with the dropping of additional stores, or it may damage the aircraft itself. Methods have been proposed to overcome such problems.
One method currently used is known as a belly band. It consists of a strip of webbing with sewn in channels or pockets into which are fitted folded lengths of wire rope provided with a weak link by which it is connected to the shackle. This device is installed or wrapped completely about the central area of a bomb, hence, the term "belly band".
In theory the wire rope deploys evenly from the pockets and the weak link breaks under load of the falling store when the rope is fully extended to extract an arming pin or open fins. In actuality, the weak link has been found unreliable, often breaking far below or far above its designed figures. Furthermore, the cross-sectional size of the wire rope presents a large enough surface to the high velocity air stream to create sufficient drag to deploy several folds of the wire rope at once. This allows the rope to form in a long U-shape between the falling store and the aircraft shackle. This condition results in fin deployment (when fins are used) dangerously close to the aircraft and collision with other stores is likely. A wire rope, even if it breaks properly, cannot be used with underwater mines because its movement about by water currents could simulate a target to a sensor and lead to untimely detonation.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,366,008 and 4,167,887 are examples of arrangements for deploying lanyards, but which may allow substantial lengths to be prematurely released by the air stream.